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Amtrak Officials View Springfield Union Station Project

U.S. Rep. Richard Neal ( D-MA), at far left, with Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno and Springfield Redevelopment Authority Director Christopher Moskal lead Amtrak representatives on a tour of the Union Station renovation work site.
WAMC
U.S. Rep. Richard Neal ( D-MA), at far left, with Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno and Springfield Redevelopment Authority Director Christopher Moskal lead Amtrak representatives on a tour of the Union Station renovation work site.
U.S. Rep. Richard Neal ( D-MA), at far left, with Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno and Springfield Redevelopment Authority Director Christopher Moskal lead Amtrak representatives on a tour of the Union Station renovation work site.
Credit WAMC
U.S. Rep. Richard Neal ( D-MA), at far left, with Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno and Springfield Redevelopment Authority Director Christopher Moskal lead Amtrak representatives on a tour of the Union Station renovation work site.

Eight months away from the scheduled completion of the renovation of Union Station in Springfield, Amtrak officials toured the work site today with the goal of providing suggestions to make the $88.5 million publicly funded project a success.

Massachusetts Congressman Richard Neal, the driving force behind the Springfield Union Station restoration, wants to utilize Amtrak’s Great American Stations Project to assure that visitors to the refurbished station will enjoy the same vibrancy and elegance that rail travelers did more than 50 years ago.

"We don't want this just to be a museum," said Neal. " We want people to use it for a variety of activities."

Neal said he is looking for Amtrak’s advice, drawn from experience with other station restorations around the country, to recover, restore, and display artifacts such as the original station clock, blackboards that were used to display railroad timetables, benches, and wooden luggage carts.

Another goal of the $88.5 million project is to make Union Station a center of activity  to serve as a catalyst for economic growth.

Patrick Kidd, of Amtrak, amidst the clamor of construction work, said that he sees a lot of potential in the plans local officials have for Union Station.

" I think anybody involved in this project realizes that it is a vision that is 20,30, 40-years down the line how it came impact the neighborhood and surrounding areas," he said.

Kidd cited several examples of what other cities have done with their restored train stations to attract visitors to their downtowns such as using for public art displays, pop-up markets, and a center for annual events that may now be happening someplace else.

After the restored Union Station opens, Amtrak will promote it as part of the Great American Station initiative.

" We want to share with others who are interested in projects like this. It will be a great inspiration to them," said Kidd.

Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno, who embraced the Union Station redevelopment when he took office 8 years ago, is counting on it, along with the MGM casino being built about a half mile to the south, to anchor the rebirth of downtown.

" Sometimes you have to jump start things with public investment and that starts private investment coming in, "said Sarno.

There are plans for 16 additional trains a day to stop in Springfield after track improvements are completed north of Hartford in about a year.

Union Station is projected to see five million people a year pass through it.

Copyright 2016 WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Paul Tuthill is WAMC’s Pioneer Valley Bureau Chief. He’s been covering news, everything from politics and government corruption to natural disasters and the arts, in western Massachusetts since 2007. Before joining WAMC, Paul was a reporter and anchor at WRKO in Boston. He was news director for more than a decade at WTAG in Worcester. Paul has won more than two dozen Associated Press Broadcast Awards. He won an Edward R. Murrow award for reporting on veterans’ healthcare for WAMC in 2011. Born and raised in western New York, Paul did his first radio reporting while he was a student at the University of Rochester.

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You just read trusted, local journalism that’s free for everyone, thanks to donors like you.

If that matters to you, now is the time to give. Join the 50,000+ members powering honest reporting and a more connected — and civil! — Connecticut.